Hey all,
Welcome to the second edition of Etcetera. the mid-week email that contains little (hopefully) helpful morsels that you can use with your staff, share with a colleague, or simply enjoy on your own.
Etcetera Vol 1 was the most read email that I’ve ever sent, and not by a small margin. Thanks for taking interest in this new little experiment. I think it’ll be fun to continue as I have the bandwidth. I’m thinking that once a month is a good cadence.
Also, I hired one of my students to run social media for my business as part of his entrepreneurship project. (I’ll be paying him, and all such student projects have to find outside revenue, so I’m not shamelessly exploiting student labor😉).
He’s convinced me that video content is so much more engaging than simple text. I’m wondering if that has anything to do with the high read rate of my last email. Let me know if you’d like to see more such content. I did create a series of vlog-style PD content for a time (see below), but it was very time-intensive. Any new video content would be more on-the-fly (unless you all are really enthusiastic).
On to the content for this week. Here are a few pieces I’ve stumbled upon in the last couple of weeks that you may enjoy, but that wouldn’t have really “fit” in the Saturday newsletter.
Cheers!
Keep it Light
A goal for our next meeting
Next time you’ve got a Zoom convo with colleagues, try this on for size.
Twinning
This is crazy!
This is pretty heartwarming. Can you imagine how much brainstorming and good advice would come from the overlap of this personal and professional relationship?! They’ll have quite the collection of stories to tell by the end of their careers.
On Doing Hard Things
The gift we can give our kids
I’ve talked about this before, but I’ve noticed the last couple of years that students are much more fearful about certain things than the were pre-COVID. Whether it’s meeting deadlines or wanting to sit next to a friend, my kids seem to be more anxious than ever.
This is never more true than in public speaking. Being a business teacher, I try to teach my kids that developing the skill of public speaking not only builds confidence, but it can also be a competitive edge when being compared to their peers for jobs and scholarships.
In this video, psychologist Kathryn Hecht claims that exposure therapy is the “gold standard” of helping little humans become more resilient (It’s a bit long, but here’s a clip to entice you). In my experience, I’d have to agree.
To address the issue in my classroom, I often let nervous students present to me one-on-one at the beginning of the term. I’ve definitely had students claim that they’re simply incapable of doing it. By the end, however, their final requires that they present to the class. Aside from students with documented accommodations, I’ve yet to have a student fail to make a final presentation.
Sometimes it takes a private negotiation and a bit of a bribe (food often does the trick), but sticking to my guns and not giving them an easy way out has become a professional conviction for me. That boost of confidence is one of the greatest gifts I can give them.
I’ve contemplated digging into this in more detail. I think it’s something that students of all ages could benefit from. And I know that many of my early elementary colleagues are experts in this domain.
Is this something you’d like to hear more about?
Change Your World
A good note to end on
